Posts Tagged ‘Election 2008’

Who elected Obama?

Last week we answered the question “Who is Barack Obama” by posing questions that Obama did not answer during the presidential campaign. This week, we take a look at who voted for him.

Police mugshots of Obama constituents

On 20 January, Barack Hussein Obama will be inaugurated as the next president of our United States, according to our Constitution. However, his largest constituencies tend to view this event as either the coronation of the “royal one” or the ordination of the “holy one.”

Before we further define those constituencies, here, for the record, is a recap of the survey data concerning the presidential election.

Some 136.6 million Americans voted — a 64.1 percent turnout and the highest since 1908. Obama is the first Democrat to win a majority of the popular vote (53 percent) since Jimmy Carter. By sex, BHO’s support was 49 percent male and 56 percent female. By ethnic group, his support comprised 41 percent of Whites, 61 percent of Asians, 75 percent of Latinos and 95 percent of Blacks. By age, BHO’s largest support demographic was 66 percent of voters under the age of 30. By income, 52 percent of voters with more than $200,000 in annual income voted for Obama. By education, his support came from those without a college degree and those with a post-graduate degree.

So, his victory was largely due to support from non-whites, from those under 30, from those with the lowest income and education, and from a small number of voters at the other end of those spectrums, while those of middle age, income and education tended to support John McCain.

By religion, Obama received support from 46 percent of Protestant voters, 56 percent of Catholic voters and 62 percent of voters of other religions. BHO received 76 percent of atheist and agnostic voters.

The Barna Research Group looked at some other interesting characteristics of Obama voters: 57 percent of those who consider themselves “lonely or isolated,” 59 percent of those affected by the economic decline in “a major way,” and 61 percent of those who claim they are “stressed out” supported BHO.

So, considering the stats, the Democrats’ strategy of fomenting dissent and disunity by promoting themes of disparity was vital to Obama’s election. Indeed, the Left’s political playbook has only one chapter defining their modus operandi — “Divide-n-Conquer.” No wonder their national leadership calls itself the DnC.

Obama’s largest constituent groups fall under the general umbrella of “disenfranchised victims,” those who feel they are ethnically or economically handicapped. Other significant constituent groups are those who identify with the disenfranchised; this includes two small but highly ideologically influential groups, the economic and academic elite.

The disenfranchised victim groups and those who identify with them have a number of common characteristics. They have a low civic IQ and virtually no understanding of our Constitutional Republic and its heritage and legacy of liberty. They have fully bought into the “Politics of Disparity” or “class warfare.”

However, it is Obama’s small economic and academic elite constituencies who pose the greatest danger to that heritage of liberty. They neither know nor care any more about liberty than the disenfranchised legions with which they seek to identify. They are the “king makers,” those who have funded and charted Obama’s course to the coronation.

Some have made a lot of “easy money,” which explains why Obama received far more support from Wall Street than McCain. Others are inheritance-welfare liberals, those who value government welfare dependence because they were, themselves, dependent on inheritance throughout their formative years and never developed the character necessary to succeed on their own initiative.

Whether fast money or inheritance, neither group has direct contact with the unwashed masses other than those who keep their homes, offices and imported autos clean and in good repair. This utter dependence upon the low end of the “service sector” is perhaps the source of the insecurities that drive them to identify with the masses.

Obama’s academic elite are just as insecure, but they are driven by ideology. They are Leftists, Western apologists for socialist political and economic agendas. Regular readers of this column will recognize them as “Useful Idiots” for their advocacy of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist collectivism. Like Obama, they reject constitutional authority and subscribe to the errant notion of a “Living Constitution”.

There are some characteristics that are common to many BHO supporters among both the disenfranchised and the elite.

Obama’s cult-like following among these constituencies is not the result of deception. In fact, it can be attributed to something much more subtle and, potentially, sinister, with far more ominous implications for the future of liberty.

Most of Obama’s supporters identify with some part of his brokenness, his dysfunctional childhood and his search for salvation in the authority of the state. The implications of this distorted mass identity are grave, and its pathology is well defined.

Another common characteristic is that liberals tend to be very emotive. Ask them about some manifestation of their worldview — for example, why they support candidates such as Obama or Hillary Clinton and they will likely predicate their response with, “Because I feel…”

On the other hand, ask conservatives about what they believe or support, and they invariably predicate their response with, “Because I think…”

So, the once great Democrat Party has now devolved into constituencies who view the inaugural as either a coronation or an ordination.

Of course, all the MSM print and tube outlets are fawning over BHO and calling next Tuesday’s inaugural “historic.” Well, it’s not often that I agree with the paper media and 24-hour news cycle talkingheads, but this is truly a historic inauguration — historic for several reasons.

First, never before has such an ill-prepared president-elect been sworn in as president. Second, never before has a more liberal president-elect been sworn into office. And third, never before has a candidate had so little regard for the constitutional oath he is taking.

Oh, and some suggest this election is historic because half of the president-elect’s genetic heritage is African — and here I thought Bill Clinton was our first “black president.”

It is no small irony that the day before Obama’s inauguration, the nation will pause to honor Martin Luther King. In 1963, King stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and gave his most famous oration, the most well known line from which is, “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

But Obama and his party have divided the nation into constituency groups judged by all manner of ethnicity and special interests rather than the individual character King envisioned.

Perhaps the most famous line from any Democrat presidential inaugural was uttered by John F. Kennedy in 1961. He closed his remarks with these words: “And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”

Barack Obama and his party have turned that clarion call on end, suggesting that their constituents should “ask what your country can do for you.”

On Tuesday, Barack Obama will take an oath “to support and defend the Constitution”, but he has no history of honoring our Constitution, even pledging that his Supreme Court nominees should comport with Leftist ideology and “break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as it’s been interpreted.”

Some have suggested that since the election is over and Obama is the victor, we should accord him the honor due his office. But if he does not honor his constitutional oath, why would anyone extend him the honor of its highest constitutional office?

“We should never despair, our Situation before has been unpromising and has changed for the better, so I trust, it will again. If new difficulties arise, we must only put forth new Exertions and proportion our Efforts to the exigency of the times.” –George Washington

I just knew that there had to be more top (ten) lists. Either for this past year, or for the new year. I found another one, and it is great!

2008 in review: Top questions Barack Obama did not answer

By Mark Alexander

Perhaps you’ve noticed an abundance of “Top Ten” lists in recent weeks. As usual, the mainstream media has churned out a variety of year-in-review pieces of late. Two events vied for top billing on all those lists — the financial meltdown and the presidential election. At present, it isn’t clear which of those debacles presents the greater threat to our nation.

The factors leading up to the economic collapse in the last two quarters are clear (see Economics 101). What is not clear, however, is whether we can limit the damage to a mere recession.

On the other hand, we have learned that Barack Hussein Obama (as he prefers to be named for his oath of office) is a charismatic master of deception and deflection. What we haven’t learned, therefore, are the answers to a plethora of questions about his citizenship, his mentors, his faith, his worldview, and his tragic childhood — a childhood which gave rise to the pathological narcissism that launched his political career and guides him to this day.

Not that many of those questions weren’t asked. Plenty of them were posed in our profiles of Obama but were met with obfuscation, prevarication and equivocation.

Who is this guy?

So, who is this guy?

In one sense he answered that question in his political autobiography, “The Audacity of Hope”: “I am new enough on the national political scene that I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”

That explains who he is in the glassy eyes of his messianic following, but who is he really? Who is Barack Hussein Obama, the president-elect of the United States of America?

In pursuit of an answer, I have compiled a list of some important questions directed at BHO that he did not answer in 2008.

Where to start … how about the beginning: Are you a natural-born citizen, as constitutionally prescribed in Article II, Section 1 and Amendment XX, Section 3, for the office of president?

When the question of citizenship came up a year ago, I presumed that this issue was a “straw man” — that your strategy was to send some adversaries on a rabbit trail to nowhere, only to release your official birth certificate just prior to the election. But you didn’t do that.

I believe that you were born in Honolulu, but I have been to the hospital where you were, ostensibly, born, and they could not produce any birth records or tell me who the attending OB might have been. Of course, 1961 is many years past.

Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle has sealed your on-file birth records, making them unavailable for verification. You refuse to request that the documents in question be made available for examination by dispassionate analysts.

To obtain a driver’s license, one has to provide some proof of citizenship — so why did you not comply as a presidential candidate? Surely you can influence the state of Hawaii to release your original birth certificate for public inspection, so this lingering question can be put to rest before your inauguration.

We know that you hold constitutional rule of law in contempt, but in the unlikely event that it is revealed sometime after your inauguration that you are not a natural-born citizen, we would be faced with a serious constitutional crisis. When do you plan to release your original birth certificate?

Moving on, given your strange childhood and broken family (similar to that of Bill Clinton, the last unmitigated narcissist to occupy the White House), you indicated that your primary childhood mentor was a communist, Frank Marshall Davis.

You claim that you never heard any of the anti-American and black-supremacist rants of your mentoring pastor, Jeremiah Wright. However, you spent 20 years in Wright’s church, he officiated at your marriage and the baptism of your children, and you identified him as a “father” figure.

Is it possible that you have been so steeped in his racist rhetoric and hatred for America that you failed to recognize it for what it was?

You claim that terrorist William Ayers was “just a guy in my neighborhood,” and that you were “just eight years old when he was a terrorist.” However, you were 34 when Ayers used his radical celebrity to launch your political career from his living room. You were 40 when this unrepentant terrorist was featured in a New York Times article (on the morning of September 11, 2001) and quoted in the opening paragraph proclaiming, “I don’t regret setting bombs. I feel we didn’t do enough.” Ayers added, “America makes me want to puke.” You were working on your second major “philanthropic” project with Ayers at that time, and when interviewed for your first Senate run, you claimed that your primary qualification for public office was your role with the ultra-Leftist Annenberg Foundation — an appointment that you received from Ayers.

So, what is the real nature of your relationship with Ayers?

Regarding your ties to the Socialist New Party, the ACORN crowd, Rod Blagojevich, Tony Rezko, Saul Alinsky, Father Michael Pfleger, Khalid al-Mansour, Kwame Kilpatrick, Louis Farrakhan, Rashid Khalidi, Raila Odinga and other haters, hard Leftists and convicted felons, are we to assume these were just “guys in your neighborhood”?

If you were a Civil Service Employee, could you pass a background check to receive a basic “Secret” clearance? If not, why should the American people trust you as the steward of their security? (OK, I know the answer. “No.”)

When you turned 18 years of age, did you register with the Selective Service System as required by law?

Regarding your “realtor” friend Rezko, how do the unusual circumstances surrounding the purchase of your Chicago mansion differ from the purchase made by former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-CA) of his California house — a purchase that ended with his arrest and conviction?

George Bernard Shaw once wrote, “A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.” All committed Socialists understand this principle. In 100 words or less, can you compare and contrast Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations with Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto? In 50 words or less, can you describe any significant difference between International Communism and National Socialism?

Whom do you hold accountable for the economic fiasco, and what is your plan to ensure it doesn’t recur? What is your plan to halt the imminent inflation resulting from the Fed’s printing of money to fund TARP and all the additional handouts?

Why do you think government can provide better and more efficient health care than the private sector? Keep in mind, yours is the same party that was regulating the housing market when it became the first economic domino to fall.

Can you explain how excessively taxing large corporations (which, in turn, pass these “fees” on to the consumer) provides economic “stimulus,” or how this makes lower- and middle-income Americans wealthier?

The motto of your campaign was “change,” but you have never specified what that change means — change from what to what? Based on the goals you have spoken about, it appears that you (and your handlers) would like to change our country from a democratic republic to a socialist/Marxist one. Would you please disabuse me of this notion?

You campaigned about needing “new blood” in Washington. Given this, how do you explain your selection of so many people from the Clinton and Carter administrations?

Our national debt stands at $10 trillion, and rises at a rate of roughly $75 million per hour each day. Do you see any problem with such large numbers, and if so, do you have a plan to fix it?

What is your plan to rein in congressional spending?

Define “rich.” As in “taxing the rich.” The amount appears to have varied depending upon which speech you and Joe Biden made during the campaign. $250,000? $200,000? $150,000? None of these pre-income tax amounts would qualify anyone as being rich, and yet, you voted to increase taxes on the “rich” at the $40,000 level.

What yardstick will you use to determine when our troops should return home from OIF and/or OEF? How will you measure success? Given that the surge strategy in Iraq has, without question, worked, why is it that you cannot simply admit you were wrong?

What is it about leaders of states who sponsor terrorism and harbor terrorists that makes you believe peace is negotiable with them? What makes you think that Iran, Syria and terrorist entities such as Hamas, Fatah and Hezbollah will adhere to anything they might “agree” to in a signed document?

What is your position on amnesty for illegal immigrants? What is your vision for immigration reform, generally?

Vice president-elect Joe Biden said, “Mark my words. It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama. … Remember I said it standing here if you don’t remember anything else I said. Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy. I can give you at least four or five scenarios from where it might originate. And he’s gonna need help. … He’s gonna need you … to stand with him. Because it’s not gonna be apparent initially, it’s not gonna be apparent that we’re right.”

What in heaven’s name was he ranting about?

In regard to your so-called “National Service Plan” you stated, “We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded [as the military].” That sounds like a force of like-minded socialists, young pioneers, brown shirts, Obama youth, ready to trade brooms for guns.

What were you talking about?

On the subject of guns, you said of the Second Amendment (the palladium of all other rights), “I believe in the Second Amendment. Lawful gun owners have nothing to fear. I said that throughout the campaign. I haven’t indicated anything different during the transition. I think people can take me at my word.” However, your nominee for attorney general, Eric Holder, reaffirmed in the recent Heller case his long-held position that the Second Amendment confers no rights of individual gun possession by private citizens.

Can we still take you at your word?

What is your position on the Enumerated Powers Act (H.R. 1359), which would require all legislation introduced in Congress to “contain a concise and definite statement of the constitutional authority” empowering Congress to enact it?

And on the subject of constitutional authority, on 20 January, you will be taking this constitutionally prescribed oath: “I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Exactly what Constitution are you swearing to “preserve, protect and defend” — that which was written by our forefathers and defended by the blood of Patriots for generations since, or its vestigial remains, the so-called “Living Constitution” as amended by Leftist judicial diktat? After all, you said you would nominate Supreme Court Justices who met your ideological test rather than those who were impartial jurists.

If the latter, should anyone take your role as commander in chief seriously?

And a final question: At a Florida rally four days before the presidential election, you asserted: “[W]e want to do this, change our tax code (a.k.a. ‘redistribute the wealth’). … John McCain [calls] this socialistic. You know I, I, I don’t know when, when, uh, when they decided they wanted to make a virtue out of selfishness.”

For the record, when you were an adolescent (by your own account, smoking dope and snorting coke) John McCain was a POW in Hanoi. Despite being a Naval Academy graduate and the son of a high-ranking admiral, McCain had requested combat duty and was assigned to the USS Forrestal. He was on the flight deck of the Forrestal during the inferno that killed 134 of his fellow sailors. He was flying his 23rd mission as part of Operation Rolling Thunder over Vietnam when his A-4E Skyhawk was shot down by a missile over Hanoi. He was subjected to more than five years of horrific torture by the Communist NVA, including two years of solitary confinement.

You claim that John McCain has made “a virtue out of selfishness.” When will you issue a public apology for that odious remark?

Ever since the election I have been commenting about how the politics of revenge will become the law of the land. My RSS feed has been going nuts about new taxes, new confiscation, and assorted other schemes that the gun control crowd are coming up with in order to deny you of your Constitutional rights with regard to being able to properly, and effectively defend your self, family, friends, and country.

The powerful gun-ban lobby has developed its own language to color and disguise its true agenda — the disarming of law-abiding Americans in every way possible, and the end of effective self defense.

Their latest set of plans — used as a fund raiser (outlined below) — is filled with nice sounding terms that put a deceptive spin on their goals. Respect for the Bill of Rights is nowhere to be found, only clever end runs and literal destruction of rights Americans have always had.

Starkly missing from these plans is any direct attack on criminals — the whole game plan is aimed at firearms the public holds. It is a product of abject gun fear — hoplophobia — that afflicts the people behind the plan. They deny they’re hoplophobic, but just look at their plans, directed solely at restricting and eliminating guns — instead of the crime caused by criminals they nominally complain about. I noticed that all mentions of accident prevention, a former holy grail for the group, are gone.

The hypocrisy is unequivocal and self evident. Sarah claims, “We need to get these ‘killing machines’ off our streets.” Well, go ahead. Any person, on any street, operating any “killing machine” belongs in prison immediately under existing law, right? Everyone, even the Bradys, know this. It doesn’t matter if your gun is black, or too short, or holds the right amount of ammo.

The problem isn’t the “machines,” it’s the lack of law enforcement — in the bad parts of town and among the gangs where most of the problems occur (see maps: http://www.gunlaws.com/GunshotDemographics.htm). They will not admit this, and they do not address this.

Instead, they act out on their phobia and attack you and me. The real problem of crime and violence is just an excuse for them to work on disarming people who didn’t do anything.

The Federal Bureaucracy of Investigation, along with the Bureaucracy of Alcohol and Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives are in complete sympathy with the plan. The Brady plan will get them more staff, more office space, more of our money and more power, the acknowledged holy grail of bureaucrats.

The new voices that are coming to the Congress appear to be sending differing signals to observers. We very well may be seeing the groundwork for a classic clash between Blue dog and Red dog Democrats. Or more probably with the Yellow Dogs in a coalitionthat will thwart extremism.

Still, rumors of pay back time political extremism have been popping up just enough to let those in the know realize that there are some pretty extreme actions on the agenda. Other bloggers are already going after these stories with a vengeance and I will defer to them so that their work gets proper attribution.

I spent a little more than thirty years living in the Denver area, and one of the things that I most enjoyed while there was listening to the blowtorch of the Rockies, 850 KOA Radio.

The entire line up is great, and they certainly do have the best trafic reports. What follows is commentary, and awards by Mike Rosen. Enjoy!

ROSEN: 2008 liberal media awards

It’s time for the 21st annual Media Research Center’s awards for the most biased, manipulative or downright goofy quotes from liberals in the “mainstream” media. I’m honored to serve, once again, on MRC’s distinguished panel of conservatively-biased judges. Here are some of the lowlights from among the winners and runners- up of Best Notable Quotables of 2008:

* Quote of the Year: Co-anchor Chris Matthews: “I have to tell you, you know, it’s part of reporting this case, this election, the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama’s speech. My – I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don’t have that too often.”

Co-anchor Keith Olbermann: “Steady.”

Matthews: “No, seriously. It’s a dramatic event. He speaks about America in a way that has nothing to do with politics. It has to do with the feeling we have about our country. And that is an objective assessment.” (Exchange during MSNBC’s coverage of the Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C., primaries, Feb 12)

* Barbra Streisand Political IQ Award for Celebrity Vapidity: “If you can read, you can walk into a job later on. If you don’t, then you’ve got the Army, Iraq, I don’t know, something like that. It’s not as bright.” (Novelist Stephen King at an April 4 Library of Congress Event for high schoolers, later carried by C-SPAN2)

* The John Murtha Award for Painting America as Racist: “What do you think the bigger obstacle is for you becoming president, the Clinton campaign machine or America’s inherent racism?” (ABC’s Chris Cuomo to Barack Obama in a Dec. 20, 2007, interview on Good Morning America)

* Half-Baked Alaska Award for Pummeling Palin

“You know the one thing that I don’t think anybody’s said yet is that she’s very mean to animals, this woman. Why does she have it in for these poor polar bears and caribou, and she aerial-kills wolves? That’s a very mean thing to do. I think that that’s an important point.” (ABC’s The View co-host Joy Behar on CNN’s Larry King Live, Sept. 9)

* Let Us Fluff Your Pillow Award for Soft & Cuddly Interviews

“What of the attacks has busted through to you? What makes you angriest at John McCain, the Republicans? What’s being said about your husband that you want to shout from the mountaintops isn’t true?” (NBC’s Brian Williams to Michele Obama in a taped interview shown on the Aug. 27 Nightly News)

* The Irrelevant Rev. Wright Award

“He was assassinated by sound bites . . . His whole career was being summed up in sound bites that added up to no more than 20 seconds, endlessly played through the media grinder of our national press. He was angry about that . . . he was like a man who goes out and picks up the morning newspaper and gets hit by a cyclone!” ( PBS’s Bill Moyers talking about the Rev. Jeremiah Wright on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show on May 13.

* The ‘Pay up, You Patriots’ Award

“It’s early April, which means these are the few days of the year when Americans of almost any political stripe unite in a perennial ritual: complaining about taxes. Count me out. I’m happy to pay my fair share to the government. It’s part of my patriotic duty – and it’s a heckuva bargain . . . There seems to be an inconsistency about people who insist on wearing flag pins in their lapels, but who grumble about paying taxes . . . Genuine patriots don’t complain about their patriotic obligations . . . Pay up and be grateful.” ( Former ABC and CNN reporter Walter Rodgers writing in the Christian Science Monitor, April 2)

As much as most of us wish that the election was over it is not. There are still races that could determine whether the forces of freedom will prevail in some small measure. Or if the socialist juggernaut of the Democrats will simply steam roll us all into some reworked version of the Soviet Union.

Gun Rights in Jeopardy
-- All Eyes on Georgia Senate Race
Gun Owners of America Political Victory Fund E-Mail Alert
8001 Forbes Pl Suite 102
Springfield VA 22151
703-321-8585
http://www.goapvf.org
Monday, November 24, 2008
Your gun rights may be hanging in the balance, depending on the
outcome of elections in Minnesota and Georgia.
The Democrats currently control 58 seats in the Senate. If they get
to 60 (the number needed to overcome a filibuster), it will be nearly
impossible to stop the gun control agenda of incoming President
Barack Obama.
The Minnesota Senate race between radical anti-gunner Al Franken and
pro-gun Sen. Norm Coleman is coming down to the provisional and
absentee ballots. Sen. Coleman's lead of fewer than 200 votes is
slipping away, while Franken and his legal team are busily trying to
steal the election.
With the growing possibility of Democrats getting to 59 Senate seats,
all eyes are now focused on Georgia.
Pro-gun Senator Saxby Chambliss is in a tight December 2nd run-off
election.
Saxby is "A" rated by Gun Owners of America. His opponent, Jim
Martin, refused to respond to the Gun Owners of America candidate
survey, but he has an anti-gun record from his days in the Georgia
State House.
No wonder that Sen. Charles Schumer, the anti-gun extremist from New
York, is so excited about this race. Schumer, who heads the
Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, is pouring tons of money
into Martin's campaign.
But the stakes are much higher than just getting another anti-gun
Senator. If Democrats can get to the magic number of 60, the minority
Senators will lose their ability to stop any gun control legislation
that is anointed by the leadership. Therefore, a world of
possibilities opens up for anti-gun Senators like Dianne Feinstein,
Chuck Schumer, Dick Durbin and Frank Lautenberg.
President-elect Obama and the Senate leadership know what is at stake
in Georgia. That's why they’re descending on the state by the
thousands and pouring in millions of dollars.
Pro-gunners need to do the same. If Saxby loses this seat, there
will be dire ramifications for years to come. Without the ability to
stop the anti-gun leadership, we could see:
* The reauthorization of the Clinton gun ban;
* Legislation to close down gun shows;
* A ban on .50 caliber rifles;
* Massive expansions of the NICS background check system;
* More and more gun stores put out of business;
* Ratification of an anti-gun UN treaty;
* Lock-up-your-safety requirements like personalized handguns, and
more.
Gun owners, sportsmen and anyone concerned about the erosion of
liberty in this country should engage in this battle in Georgia.
If you live in or near Georgia and can volunteer to make calls, knock
on doors, etc, please call or e-mail the Chambliss campaign right
away. Go to http://www.saxby.org for contact information.
Saxby also needs the financial resources to reach as many voters as
possible in the final days before the election. Please go to
http://www.saxby.org/contribute.aspx to contribute to the Chambliss
campaign.
This race is extremely close. Senator Saxby Chambliss has stood with
gun owners in the U.S. Congress. It's time for us to stand with Saxby
now. Please visit http://www.saxby.org to help Sen. Chambliss win
this election.
Sincerely,
Tim Macy
Vice Chairman

Change! That was the mantra of the Obamasia was it not? Well, so far it appears that we will be having a rerun of the Clinton years. Are we really wanting to see things going on like that again?I mean, after all is said and done can we truly be proud of the things that went on with the “Crew.” From one thing after another it was a very bad time for America. So much change that Hillary Clinton will be Secretary of State?

What follows is from last Fridays Patriot Post, enjoy.

As the Obama administration begins to take shape, “change” has become little more than a bag of recyclables from the Clinton years. On a near-daily basis, it seems, Barack Obama has stocked his shelves with Clinton retreads or other longtime Swamp-dwellers. The next attorney general, for one, will be Eric Holder, Bill Clinton’s deputy attorney general from 1997-2001. Holder was instrumental in returning young Elian Gonzales to Communist Cuba at gunpoint, and in processing that rogue’s gallery of Clinton pardons in January 2001. Nothing like the smell of change…

The post that everyone is talking about, however, is that of secretary of state. Swamp gossip points to Hillary Clinton as the prime candidate, but despite some wishful thinking, it is not a done deal. History has proven that the best secretary of state is the one who acts as the mouthpiece of the president. Think Henry Kissinger or James Baker III. Those who do not promote the president’s ideological stance tend to be failures, pushing America’s foreign policy off the rails. Think Colin Powell. With that in mind, it’s hard to picture Hillary Clinton as the person charged with acting as the international mouthpiece of President Obama.

On the campaign trail, these two held strongly opposing views on American foreign policy. It could be said that Obama wants Clinton on board precisely because she can make up for his own inadequacies in foreign policy. If that is the case, then what does one do about the elephant in the room — i.e., Bill? As we all know, he has made a cottage industry of the ex-presidency, raking in millions of dollars from overseas speeches, consulting and philanthropy. As a private citizen, he’s of course allowed to keep many of his dealings secret, but how many of those secret deals will run into direct conflict with the interests of the United States if his wife is secretary of state? Clintonistas say this is not an issue, which means it’s a huge issue.

Furthermore, Hillary still has a future to consider. She has made a name for herself in the Senate, and another run for the White House isn’t out of the question. However, if she is tied to Obama’s administration and it falters, then she is likely to absorb a share of the blame. Perhaps the best advice came from former UN ambassador John Bolton: “Obama should remember the rule that you should never hire somebody you can’t fire.”

Meanwhile, what happened to John Kerry, who was openly vying the secretary of state post? He was recently named chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — ironically, the very committee to which he testified in 1971 that U.S. soldiers in Vietnam were committing war crimes. According to Kerry, our military personnel in Vietnam “personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, [blew] up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to … the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.” Kerry then added, “There are all kinds of atrocities and I would have to say that, yes, yes, I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other soldiers have committed.” So now we have a confessed war criminal in charge of the Foreign Relations Committee. That’s a change, all right.

On one blog the liberals are yet again trying to push the failed ideology of universal health care as some sort of inalienable right. Well? It might be thought that is so in Canada and other places. It is not listed in the Bill of Rights or anywhere else in the Constitution of the United States. The following by Mona Charen sums things up rather nicely concerning that, as well as what I see as a pretty decent assessment of the last election cycle. This was in last Fridays Patriot Post.

Unlike some who shall, in the interests of comity, remain nameless — conservatives do not cry foul when they lose elections. They do not whine that the election was stolen, or secured through dirty campaign tricks, or otherwise illegitimately won. Instead, they ask themselves where they went wrong.

The National Review Institute, a think tank founded by the late William F. Buckley and now headed by the dynamic and perspicacious Kate O’Beirne, hosted a daylong conference in Washington, D.C., to examine where conservatives need to go from here. It was a very clarifying day.

Yes, the Democrats got a big win on Nov. 4 and there is no gainsaying that Republicans and conservatives were rejected. Then again, it would have defied 200 years of American history if the party holding the White House for two terms and presiding over a huge financial panic should have been successful. Add to that the essentially content-free McCain campaign and you have yourself a drubbing.

But did liberal ideas win? Identification with the Republican Party is down. But the number of voters who identify themselves as liberal (22 percent) is nearly identical to the results four years ago (21 percent). Thirty-four percent, the same as in 2004, still identify as conservatives. And while slightly more voters expressed a desire for more government activism in 2008 than in 2004, the panting eagerness in the press for a reprise of the New Deal (note the cover of Time magazine) is not widely shared by the electorate.

Lacking political strength for the battles to come, conservatives will have to rely on the strength of their ideas. The most important battle, Yuval Levin of the Ethics and Public Policy Center argued, will be health care. If health care is successfully nationalized in America, the case for a smaller and less bureaucratic state becomes immeasurably more difficult. Throughout the developed world, in countries that have adopted socialized medicine, every call to limit the size and scope of government is instantly caricatured as an attempt to take medicine away from the weak and sick. People become awfully attached to “free” medical care even though it is emphatically not free (it is supported through higher taxes), even though it requires waiting periods for care (even in cases of cancer and other serious illnesses), and even though it deprives people of the latest technology (the city of Pittsburgh has more MRI scanners than the entire nation of Canada).

National Review’s Jim Manzi stressed a theme that has been circulating in the works of Ross Douthat, Ramesh Ponnuru (both of whom spoke later in the day), David Frum, and others, namely that the Republican Party erred by failing to address concerns of the broad middle class. Republicans tended to talk only of income taxes, neglecting the FICA or payroll tax that all wage earners pay. Douthat, author (with Reihan Salam) of “Grand New Party,” expanded on that theme. He outlined three traps facing the American right: 1) Demography. The groups that tend to vote Democrat — single women, Hispanics and other minorities — are expanding. The groups that vote for Republicans — married women, white Christians — are contracting. 2) Socio-economic. Middle-class wage stagnation over the past couple of decades has made the welfare state look better to more people (also, see single mothers above — the collapse of the two-parent family is probably a greater threat to future Republican success than any other single factor). 3) Ideological. Douthat argues that conservatives have confused policy with principle and have become wedded to particular solutions (like school vouchers) instead of flexibly seeking conservative approaches to new challenges.

We will need that flexibility as well as a renewed commitment to conservative principles now more than ever as we face a charismatic new president and a Democratic Congress. Republicans have been (myopically) tax-focused, which is a diminishing asset now that fewer and fewer Americans pay income taxes.

Not all of the cultural indicators are negative. Abortion is down, as is the divorce rate (though more people are cohabiting, which is terrible for kids). Crime declined when no one predicted that it would. Conservatives have won tough domestic battles (welfare reform) before — even with Democratic presidents. The next big battle is health care. After that, we shore up the traditional family. It won’t be easy, but this is the land of opportunity — and despair is a sin.

A seismic shift, a watershed moment, an electoral landslide or the dawn of a new era. No matter what the turn of phrase, Nov. 4, 2008, will go down in the history books as the beginning of the end of the 30-year political reign of the ultra-right and its vicious pro-corporate agenda, and the end of a beginning of new politics in the United States of America.

Convinced by the power of one man’s arguments for hope, unity and change, his program and example, a 52 percent majority of voters rejected the old politics of fear, racism and red-baiting and elected Barack Obama the 44th president of the United States.

Perhaps it was historically inevitable that this country elected its first African American president. The dynamics of slavery, race and racism, together with the historic role of the African American freedom movement in helping propel the expansion of democracy for all people, have always been a central narrative to the making of America.

An accident of history, maybe, is the fact that in 2009 the country will celebrate the bicentennial birthday of another tall, lanky, transformative figure from Illinois: Abraham Lincoln.

In this age of 24-hour news cycles and instant information, when a seismic victory happens it’s important to take a breath and reflect even while celebrating. There will be analysis in the coming weeks in our pages and web site. We’ll be taking closer looks at the many different actors, issues and developments.

But here is an initial take, a basic framework to ponder and analyze such a momentous moment. This was a victory for the whole U.S. working class. And workers of all job titles, professions, shapes, colors, sizes, hairstyles and languages put their indelible stamp on this victory.

This is an important point to ponder, not only for people here in the U.S., but also for our sisters and brothers around the world. The U.S. working class is pushing for a new day — in which our country can be a good global citizen and not the “rogue state” the Bush administration has projected.

The most organized section of the working class — the labor movement — played a stellar role in this election, organizing more than 250,000 labor activists in critical battleground states. But it was its role in challenging and educating union members on racial bias, coupled with a program for economic recovery, that labor proved its invaluable mettle.

A powerful coalition of forces, inspired towards a new kind of politics, bubbled up from the ground of discontent sown by the authoritarian, reckless and greed-driven policies of the Bush administration. Union members and retirees of all races and the African American people as a whole joined with the emerging political might of Latinos — Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans, Cuban Americans and others — and with women and young people en masse to successfully challenge the power of the ultra-right. And the seeds of a renewed and strengthened Jewish-Black unity — historically so key to civil rights progress — are taking root.

Such unity — as President-elect Obama said — of “young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled” is an idea that has been grasped by millions of people and made into a material force shattering the Republicans’ “Southern strategy” and forcing this party of the reactionary right into a meltdown.

The election outcome represents a clear mandate for pro-people change on taxes, health care, the war in Iraq, job creation and economic relief, union organizing and the Employee Free Choice Act. Reform and relief are in the air. Their scope and depth will be the arena of struggle. The best thing the coalition that won this victory can do is to stick together and help the new administration carry through on its promises. We suspect an Obama administration will have to govern from the center with progressive and left voices included in the dialogue along with conservatives. The ultra-right and corporate interests will do everything in their power to limit, and even steal, the people’s victory.

Jubilation and celebration, yes, along with realization that the hard work is just beginning

Well, the Bolsheviks certainly appear to be happy. Almost reminds me of the shouts of glee that would emanate from the Students Union at U.C. Berkley during the sixties when the daily American casualty counts would be announced by Walter Cronkite.

Downsize D.C. keeps their turbulant tradition going with this not so politicaly correct commentary. Enjoy!

Quote of the Day: “It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” — William Shakespeare

Subject: Not your usual post-election commentary

The media describes every election as historic, the most important in a generation, etc. When the voting is done they tell us a new era has dawned, that things will change, that nothing will ever be the same, blah, blah, blah.

One aspect of these claims is true, this time. It is both historic and meaningful that the United States has elected its first African-American president. We applaud and celebrate this. We think the significance of this event transcends mere symbolism. Otherwise, the election was what all other elections have been . . .

” . . . a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

Can we support this harsh assessment? Consider . . .

The election thoroughly repudiated the Republican Party. They lost the White House in a landslide, and got clobbered in Congressional races. We might assume from this, if elections really produced change, that many Republican policies of the last eight years will be reversed. We predict that almost none of them will be.

The Republicans were responsible for . . .

* Enacting the largest new entitlement in decades — the prescription drug program
* Passing social engineering schemes like “No Child Left Behind”
* Starting an un-provoked war
* Gutting constitutional liberties
* Running-up vast deficits

Will the Democrats reverse any of these actions? Sadly, we think the answer is “No.” What, then, was the point of the election?

Was it merely to punish the Republicans while leaving their sins uncorrected? Was the purpose to give the Democrats permission to pursue all of their own pet projects for social engineering, and to spend, spend, spend to their hearts content?

Undoubtedly this last item is the message Democratic politicians will claim they heard. After all, they received a mandate, and if the mandate was not to pursue their dreams then the word has no meaning.

Of course, some voters can say, “Don’t blame me, I voted Libertarian . . . or for the Constitution Party . . . or the Greens.” Didn’t these voters, at least, send a clear message about what they want?

We think not.

What does the average person assume when he or she sees third party candidates listed in his newspaper with tiny vote percentages next to their names? We think he or she assumes that . . .

“Those are fringe candidates with fringe ideas that no one supports. Therefore, I need not consider what they have to say.”

The system is rigged against third parties. This guarantees low vote totals for those parties. It also guarantees that the ideas those parties represent will always be viewed as marginal.

Third parties don’t promote ideas, they marginalize them!

Oh yes, we know all about the exceptions, like the Socialists and the Progressives, both of whom had ideas adopted by the major parties. But please notice, those ideas made the politicians, and even tax-funded intellectuals in the school system, MORE POWERFUL. That’s the real reason those ideas were adopted; it wasn’t because the Socialists and the Progressives managed to score a few points on Election Day.

So what does voting for partisan candidates actually accomplish? What does it communicate? As far as we can tell the answer is nothing, except that . . .

It gives the victims of the con game — the American people — an illusion of control. But we have no control — no say so.

Voting in the partisan electoral contest merely gives sanction to the con-artists who constantly victimize us. That’s the role of the voter, to sanction what the politicians do. That’s it. It’s like Emma Goldman said, “If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal.”

Is this the way you want things to be?

The ways of the future do not lie in the ways of the past. The ways of the past involved hoping the new boss would be different than the old boss. But many decades have come and gone, and the new boss has always been the same as the old boss. We should abandon the old ways and adopt new ways.

The way to a better future lies in withdrawing our consent and issuing direct orders to our supposed public servants. Votes send confusing signals. But plain talk is rarely misunderstood.

The new way involves building a new social force with the power to make public servants miserable. Withdraw consent. Issue orders. Make the public servant submit.

The politicians are busy right now convincing themselves that the public wants top-down, centralized, Democratic social engineering. Who can disabuse them of this notion? After all, the votes have been cast. The people have spoken.

Only YOU can disabuse the politicians of their self-serving interpretations of inarticulate votes. The Republicans were repudiated. Therefore, the things the Republicans did must also be repudiated. This should be the mandate for the new Congress. Fortunately, we have a vehicle for doing just that . . .